Tag Archives: Bank Transfer Day

I have just read the most wonderful piece of prose on the Occupy Movement by Charles Eisenstein, author of Sacred Economics. And today I have been interviewed for Planet FM on the world's Problems so I am thinking about the Occupy Movement.
I think they will eventually win and suspect it will take years. It was so inspiring to read the Dominion this morning and see that St Paul's Cathedral in London was letting the protesters camp there and that the Anglican church is launching a fierce attack on greedy bankers, accusing them of having "slipped their moral moorings."
Nov 5th was Bank Transfer day, the day people are called on by the Occupy movement to transfer their bank accounts to a credit union. Credit unions didn't go down in the Global Financial Crisis of 2008 and have excellent facilities for changing automatic payments. They have ATM machines round the country. A good choice if you don't mind going without a credit card. They are financial co-operatives where the customers own the bank so you can go to their AGM and stand for their board. They don't deal in derivatives.
Very recently the PSIS has managed to acquire bank status with the Reserve Bank and is now rebranded as the Co-operative Bank. Up to now their cheque books had to have the Bank of New Zealand them, presumably because BNZ did their credit clearing overnight. So you can change your account to them, but remember to keep a close watch on how they change. Will they deal in derivatives? They have the right to. Will they deal in shares and bonds and their derivatives? Will they get into insurance or wealth management services? They shouldn't. Banks should be prohibited by law from doing anything but banking (the Glass Steigel Act in USA) and we had a similar prohibition before Roger Douglas deregulated the banks in the 1980s. Yes old fashioned banks were doing what old fashioned banks did best – taking in deposits and lending them out.